What is Full-Stack Web Development?

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From the course by The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

Server-side Development with NodeJS, Express and MongoDB

493 ratings

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The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

Server-side Development with NodeJS, Express and MongoDB

493 ratings

Course 4 of 4 in the Specialization Full-Stack Web Development with React

This course deals with all things server-side. We base the entire course around the NodeJS platform. We start with a brief overview of the Web protocols: HTTP and HTTPS. We examine NodeJS and NodeJS modules: Express for building web servers. On the database side, we review basic CRUD operations, NoSQL databases, in particular MongoDB and Mongoose for accessing MongoDB from NodeJS. We examine the REST concepts and building a RESTful API. We touch upon authentication and security. Finally we review backend as a service (BaaS) approaches, including mobile BaaS, both open-source and commercial BaaS services. At the end of this course, you will be able to: - Demonstrate an understanding of server-side concepts, CRUD and REST - Build and configure a backend server using NodeJS framework - Build a RESTful API for the front-end to access backend services

From the lesson

Introduction to Server-side Development

In this module you will be introduced to Node, Node modules and the Node HTTP server. You will learn about the Express framework and how to set up a REST API using Express.

What is Full-Stack Web Development?5:02

Meet the Instructors

Jogesh K. Muppala
Associate Professor
Department of Computer Science and Engineering

What is Full Stack Web Development?.

Let me clarify to you a few terms so that we start with a common understanding

of full stack web development as applied in this specialization.

We often hear people talking about the front end and the back end.

The front end is where we are delivering the content to the user,

typically in a browser where the user accesses the information.

This is where we use technologies like HTML,

CSS and JavaScript to render the content for the user.

This information delivery is supported behind the scenes by

a back end support which is typically implemented these days using technologies like PHP,

Java, ASP.NET, Ruby, Python or NodeJS.

We often hear people talking about the three-tier architecture for web development.

In this approach, the entire web application is organized into three different layers.

The presentation layer which is concerned with delivering the information to the user.

So, this is usually the UI related

concerns that are dealt with at the presentation layer.

The business logic layer on the other hand is concerned

more about the data, the data validation,

the dynamic content processing and generating the content to be delivered to the user.

This is backed up behind the scenes

with the data persistence layer or the data access layer.

So, this is concerned with how we store and interact with the data,

typically in the form of a database and access this data through an API.

Exploring this further, let us see what is implemented

typically in the traditional web development in each of these three layers.

The business logic layer is usually implemented these days using technologies like Ruby,

Python, PHP, Java, C++ or ASP.NET.

This business logic layer is interacting behind the scenes with

the persistent data typically stored in

a relational database and accessed by the business logic layer.

The business logic layer is also concerned

with the rendering of information to the front side,

typically, in the form of server-side rendering this case.

So, the HTML, CSS and JavaScript is generated on

the server-side and then sent over to the client-side in the form of a web page.

In this approach, we need specialists in each of these three layers.

So, a front-end specialists typically would be well-versed in HTML, CSS and JavaScript.

The business logic specialist would be

well-versed in one of the technologies that is used for

implementing the business logic and then you need

a data specialist who will be well-versed in the relational database management system.

There is an increasing trend towards using a single language

to implement the entire stack, this being JavaScript.

So, you could have the front-end implemented, for example,

as a single page application using frameworks like Angular or React.

You have the server-side or

the business logic layer being implemented using technologies like NodeJS,

which is also dependent on JavaScript.

Then you have the data storage itself being implemented using technologies

like MongoDB which stores data in the form of JSON documents.

The information exchange between the server-side and the client-side is usually done

using JSON as the format and the server-side supports a REST API endpoint.

We will cover all these technologies as part of this specialization.

So, as you go through this specialization,

you will see that on the presentation layer side,

we will cover Bootstrap 4,

an Angular or React for implementing front-end applications.

Then on the business logic layer,

we will be using NodeJS and NodeJS modules

and Express for implementing the business logic layer.

We'll also consider back end as a service and then

the data support implemented using MongoDB.

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